Mozart's Mass in C minor, K. 427, of 1783, known as the "Great" C minor mass, was left unfinished for unknown reasons, which is especially odd considering that Mozart was writing it for performance by his wife, Constanze, in Salzburg's grand St. Peter's Abbey. The mass marked Mozart's return to the city from which he had skipped out in a controversial situation two years earlier, and the plan was to introduce Constanze to Mozart's father and older sister. Thus he had every motivation to make a big impression with the work, ...
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Mozart's Mass in C minor, K. 427, of 1783, known as the "Great" C minor mass, was left unfinished for unknown reasons, which is especially odd considering that Mozart was writing it for performance by his wife, Constanze, in Salzburg's grand St. Peter's Abbey. The mass marked Mozart's return to the city from which he had skipped out in a controversial situation two years earlier, and the plan was to introduce Constanze to Mozart's father and older sister. Thus he had every motivation to make a big impression with the work, and indeed it is of large dimensions, with a Handelian feel, but the Agnus Dei and second half of the Credo are missing. Various completions have been proposed; the one here, by Helmut Eder, adds missing orchestrations in the existing section but no new music. Marc Minkowski and his veteran early music group Les Musiciens du Louvre avoid the oddities of some of Minkowski's other recent recordings, with the only questionable decision being that to use the four soloists as the second...
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